Plovdiv walking tour & city guide

Roman Plovdiv

The Roman theater, built in the 1st century and rediscovered after a landslide in the 1970s, is one of the best-preserved in the world and hosts opera and concerts in summer, with views over the city. Part of the Roman stadium lies beneath the main pedestrian street, where you can look down on its curved stone seats.

The main pedestrian street, one of the longest in Europe, runs from the stadium past the Dzhumaya Mosque to Central Square, lined with shops and cafés.

The Old Town and Kapana

The Old Town climbs a hill above the center, its cobbled lanes lined with brightly painted houses from the 19th-century Bulgarian National Revival, many of them now museums and galleries. At the top, the ruins of Nebet Tepe give sweeping views over the city's hills.

Kapana, meaning 'the trap', is a maze of small streets that was once a craftsmen's quarter and is now the city's creative district, full of murals, bars and design shops.

Visiting tips

Wear good shoes for the steep cobblestones of the Old Town. Plovdiv is about two hours from Sofia by bus or train, and the Bachkovo Monastery and the Rhodope Mountains are within easy reach.